The traditional culinary or kitchen ladle is used extensively in various settings for serving various liquid foods and liquid-solid food mixtures such as soup, sauces, stews, gravy, fruit punch or the like. The conventional culinary ladle typically includes a bowl-like receptacle having a substantially concave wall defining a peripheral rim or edge. The bowl-like receptacle is rigidly mounted at one end of a substantially long and slender shank having a hand-grip portion at its other end. The rim normally defines a spout at a location about the edge. The handle, in turn, is typically attached to the bowl-like receptacle along its outer circumference, approximately 90 degrees from the spout.
During use, a user typically grasps the handle of a conventional ladle and dips the ladle bowl into a food container. The liquid food or liquid-solid foods mixture flows into the bowl-like container of the ladle until it is filled to a desired level. The user via the handle then transfers the ladle to a second container such as a plate or serving dish.
To dispense the food from the ladle, the spout is typically positioned over the second receptacle such that, typically, the spout faces the user. The user begins by rotating his or her wrist to tip the the ladle until it is filled to a desired level. The user via the handle then transfers the ladle to a second container such as a plate or serving dish.
To dispense the food from the ladle, the spout is typically positioned over the second receptacle such that, typically, the spout faces the user. The user begins by rotating his or her wrist to tip the spout downward. Typically, the handle is swung in a rather long arc in order to tilt the receptacle in such a manner as to discharge the content of the ladle.
Although conventional ladles have been used extensively for a great number of years, they nevertheless suffer from numerous drawbacks. One of these drawbacks relates to the fact that although the bowl-like receptacle of the conventional ladle is relatively easy fill by dipping it into a relatively large container holding a relatively large or deep volume of food, these conventional ladles have proven to be unsuitable for scooping foodstuff located substantially adjacent the base wall or base-to-peripheral wall corner section of typical food containers.
Indeed, the substantially hemi-spherical configuration of most ladle bowls only allows a limited arc section of the bowl peripheral edge to contact or to be positioned adjacent the bowl receptacle base wall. Also, the generally rounded configuration of the conventional ladle bowl precludes the conventional ladles from being able to reach in the base-to-peripheral wall corner section of most conventional food containers. The typical radius of curvature of the base-to-peripheral wall corner section of most conventional food containers being typically smaller than the radius of the hemi-spherical bowl-like containers of conventional ladles, the conventional ladles are incapable of scooping foodstuff located adjacent the base-to-peripheral wall corner sections of conventional food containers and, a fortiori, of scraping the base-to-peripheral wall corner section of food containers.
The incapacity of conventional food ladles to be used satisfactorily adjacent the base wall and base-to-peripheral wall corner sections of conventional food containers potentially leads to considerable wastage of valuable foodstuff. It also forces users of such conventional ladles to purchase, use and maintain additional make-shift culinary implements such as smaller spoons used for scooping foodstuff adjacent corner sections of the conventional food containers, scraping implements for scraping both the bottom wall and corner sections of conventional food containers and the like.
Accordingly, there exists a need for an improved ladle facilitating scooping of foodstuff from a position located adjacent both the food container base wall and the container base-to-peripheral wall corner section. There also exists a need for an improve ladle allowing for scraping of a conventional food container base wall and scraping of a conventional food container base-to-peripheral corner section.
Another disadvantage associated with most conventional culinary ladles relates to the fact that the typical movement required for discharging the foodstuff from a bowl-like container of conventional ladles is typically ergonomically unacceptable. Indeed, the limited range of movement of the human wrist sometimes prevents the user from emptying the ladle bowl solely by using the wrist. Also, the distribution of the weight of the foodstuff within the ladle bowl is such that it sometimes requires a forearm strength exceeding that of some individuals.
As a consequence, instead of only using the wrist, once the range limit of the wrist is reached, the user must rotate and extend his or her arm and shoulder. Thus, the user is forced to awkwardly rotate his or her wrist, arm and shoulder to completely empty the contents of the ladle bowl. This not only potentially leads to spillage incidents but may also lead, in the long run, to repetitive-type stress injuries for individuals using conventional ladles more extensively such as cooks, chefs and the like.
The unnatural and ergonomically unsound motion is further complicated when the ladle is used in a partially shielded environment. For example, at many restaurant salad bars, a plastic shield or “sneeze guard” constricts the area available for manipulating the ladle when pouring salad dressings, soups and the like. The plastic shield basically prevents the user from performing the exaggerated arm and shoulder motion required by the standard ladle design. The standard ladle design hence typically greatly impedes simpler pouring motions. Accordingly, there exists a need for a ladle designed for more ergonomic and convenient pouring.
Still, another disadvantage associated with most conventional prior art ladles relates to their apparent lack of versatility. For example, most conventional ladles are incapable of serving the liquid only or the solids only from the liquid-solid mixtures. Solids can be removed from a liquid-solid mixture by using an additional implement such as a perforated strainer or spoon. The strainer is, however, incapable of serving the liquid-only from the liquid-solid mixture. For example, with respect to fruit punches, most people would prefer not to have solids in their drinks. In other situations, for example, it may be necessary to serve only broth from soup or only solids such as eggs from an egg bath.
Separating devices have been proposed in the prior art but they suffer from major drawbacks including unergonomical features and considerable complexity. Accordingly, there exists a need for an improved sieving ladle allowing for liquid-solid separation of liquid-solid food mixtures.
Yet, still another drawback associated with most conventional ladles relates to the difficulty in obtaining a relatively constant pouring flow in typical settings wherein the volume of food stuff within the ladle bowl varies. For example, in situations wherein the ladle is used to pour sauce over various dish plates, it may prove desirable to obtain a substantially constant pouring flow while pouring the sauce over different plates so as to obtain a generally similar or uniform plate presentation.
However, as the sauce is poured from one plate to another, the quantity of sauce remaining in the ladle bowl diminishes hence requiring a compensating or counter-balancing adjustment of the pouring motion. For example, as the volume of foodstuff within the ladle bowl diminishes, the pouring tilt of the ladle may need to be more pronounced. This compensating adjustment of the pouring stroke may prove to be tedious and may also lead to even more ergonomically questionable movements.
Accordingly, there exists a need for an improved ladle allowing for relative control over the pouring flow pattern so as to enable a generally uniform pouring flow pattern regardless of the quantity of foodstuff within the ladle bowl. Also, there exists a need for an improved ladle allowing for control of the pouring flow so as to enable a single ladle to be used for simulating the pouring flow pattern of ladles having various sizes and configurations.
Yet, still another disadvantage associated with those conventional culinary ladles relates to the inability of such conventional ladles to provide an assessment or evaluation of the quantity of foodstuff within the ladle bowl. This may lead to the need for additional implements such as measuring cups and, accordingly, to additional cooking steps such as pouring the food stuff into a measuring cup and then pouring back a measured volume into the cooking ladle. This, in turn, may prove to be both tedious and time-consuming.
Accordingly, there exists a need for an improved ladle having foodstuff volume measuring capacities.
A further disadvantage associated with conventional culinary ladles attempting to improve on the ergonomicity thereof or to increase their versatility, is that they are typically structurally complex and, hence, both more susceptible to failure and relatively expensive to manufacture. Accordingly, there exists a general need for an improved culinary ladle.